very tedious
by homulilly
Summary: "Hey, should I read you a story…?" [ leo, elliot. maybe elliot/leo if you squint. for chu.]


note: for chu-senpai on tumblr. also, a reference to something between me and boyfriendo.

* * *

He places a washcloth over his burning head, frowning heavily at the pathetic sight. Especially when Leo just ends up looking hotter and uncomfortable with the wet cloth, coughs and sneezes leaving him even more so. Every other minute his temperature was changing from freezing cold to overheating without any pauses in between. Elliot, when Leo sickly asks for it, brings the tissue box closer, sighing once Leo blows his nose into it, the frown increasing when it's so loud.

Then Leo pulls the tissue away, with bright red blood on it. The idea itself is enough to make Elliot sick.

"That is _it, _we're taking you to the doctor!"

Leo flinches heavily when Elliot raises his voice to basically a sharp cry, it takes a bit for his eyes to open (a struggle, more like, and that just gives Elliot _more _reason to demand a ride to the hospital) then gives him a pitiful glare that hits him close to home. That look is the same one he got from Gilbert all those months ago, when he was poisoned. But the doctor said Leo had a deadly case of the flu and demanded he must stay away from other people and the hospital itself. The disease had to be contained; of course, no one had yet found a really good cure for it…

It would have been useless to try and drag Elliot away from Leo, though.

"Elliot, you remember what the doctor said—"

"I don't give a single shit what the doctor said! You—"

Leo gives him that look again, but the glare is gone, and it's completely depressing. It's like he's almost _pleading, begging, _and Leo has never begged to him for as long as Elliot's known him. Another memory of a sick, nearly dead Gilbert flashes in his brain. But what Leo was saying was true. It would just case suffering for others, too.

And so, while not happy at all, Elliot huffs and sits down next to Leo, who's shaking hands reach for his cup of herbal tea. At least some good came out of this. The blond had learned how to prepare tea for Leo, who commented on the first day of sickness that tea used to help when he was sick back the orphanage or his village.

Time flies, and Elliot stares at the ceiling, dread silently creeping into his heart the more he compares Leo's state to Gilbert's. The silence currently doesn't help, and without his knowing, Elliot's hand squeezes Leo's free one, and clutches it tightly like a vice. Eventually, Leo feels the pressure increase and it's not so very… nice.

"Elliot, let go of my hand, you're hurting me!"

Elliot whips around automatically to deny it, but then sees his hand _is _holding Leo's rather tightly, and lets it go just in time, right when Leo's body shoots up out of the blanket and he violently coughs, hacking up blood. Uneasiness creeps further, and Elliot has to do something to get his mind off death and illness and poison and blood.

"Hey, should I read you a story…?"

And that's how it begins.

For the rest of the time Leo suffers with that awful, dreadful flu, Elliot is by his side, reading him stories. Soon enough, the pair find that fairytales help Leo fall to sleep better than the rest, and Elliot goes through rather embarrassing moments in the Nightray's library to get the books, having to avoid Vanessa in particular, who probably would have locked him up a room and demanded the reason he was getting the books was because he missed being coddled by his siblings and mother.

His voice is droning on, bored, as he reads the fairytale in his hands. Of course, when the knight was slaying the dragon to rescue the prince, especially when the knight ended up blinding the dragon, Elliot's tone of voice and body language had gotten a lot more excited and lively and Leo laughed gently, smiling happily at the sight of his master so gleeful. Leo later teased him about it, in his old playful tone, and Elliot shushed him back to bed, continuing the story…

"Dear god, this book is tedious…"

He glances at Leo, who's long fallen asleep, chest rising and falling gently with the rocking of his bones. _Does everyone look younger in their sleep? _Because, for all Elliot knows, he's the boy he met in the orphanage two years ago. With a smile on his face, he brushes his hair back and removes the glasses, placing them on the nearby table.

"…But maybe that's the purpose. Sweet dreams, Leo."


End file.
